Dear all

Hope life is travelling well for you.

Thank you to everyone who has written to me, despite my lack of personal correspondence.

I’m typing this now as I am travelling by train to Hinckley (near Leister) where I am working this week. The view outside is white, very white. It’s been snowing the last 3 days and the northern regions are expecting 10 inches today. Apparently this is unusual for England to have constant snow. As it is only morning, the snow is still white and looks quite pretty.

Contrary to my previous accounts on the weather, it’s not that cold. As my body has adjusted to the cold, I find the weather reasonable where the locals are all wandering around saying ‘it’s so cold/freezing!’ :) This is slightly amusing.

Work is still reasonable. Have been learning about manufacturing companies, the personal income tax system, pensions/superannuation and now about motor dealers. I’ve only done a few hours overtime so I can’t complain. Everyone is quite friendly but the office itself is disorganised. I’m getting used to finding out last thing Friday where I’m going the next week and trying to work out how I’ll get there as they all seem to forgot that

• I don’t have a car and
  
  
• I really don’t know where everything is around here and how to get there by public transport.
  

It’s weird being the new kid on the block, but am picking it up alright.
On the fun side of things Rhys and I visited Dublin last weekend. It was awesome. Due to the timing of the cheapest tickets, I arrived Sat morning and left Sunday morning but flew into London instead.

However, in my less than 24 hour visit to Dublin I did fit in the following:

• Trinity college
  
  
• Grafton St Mall/(High Street)
  
  
• St Stephen’s Green (had a lake/pond, quite pretty too)
  
  
• National Library (huge dome and traditional reading room – very cool)
  
  
• One side of the Castle (every city’s got one), but was only open from 2-4 so we did not go in.
  
  
• City Hall
  
  
• Temple Bar – food markets (bought some homemade Jam and Pesto)
  
  
• National Photographic Gallery + a photographic gallery in the area (had a photo taken by a 5 year old on display – it was impressive!)
  
  
• Merrion Square (ok, not as pretty as St Stephen’s Green)
  
  
• A tourist shop that we got a good deal on Guinness Pint glass
  
  
• National Museum (more of a kiddies thing so we spent 30 seconds in there to escape from the rain before leaving again)
  
  
• Some other park trying to find the National Opera Hall.
  
  
• St Patrick’s Cathedral – very impressive, ie big and old but closed so we couldn’t enter.
  
  
• Christ Church Cathedral & Dublinia – closed but looked good from the outside
  
• Audden’s Gate – a viking built structure dating 1275.
• ST Augustine’s Cathedral – this was the most amazing cathedral I’ve seen. I was more in awe of it than St Peter’s Basilica in Rome. Might have something to do with the fact that there were not hundreds of tourists in there. It was really beautiful and awe inspiring. Not on tourist map, but managed to walk past the large structure and be intrigued by it. Luckily it was open. :)
  
• Guinness Storehouse. Learnt all about it. :) The gravity bar up top gave an awesome 360 view of the city. Still don’t like guinness but I tried.
  
• Dinner at Flanagan’s and had a Gaelic Combo. J Decided against the Irish Stew but had a Bailey’s parfait for dessert. :)

So had a great time in Dublin.

The next day we managed a short visit to the National Gallery in London (on Trafalgar Square) before dining at the excellent Wagamama’s near Covent Gardens with Tina, George and Harry. Had a great time ragging the English among other topics. :)

Also had a great breakfast at some small café in Canada Square/Canary Wharf that morning. Cheap and big serving.

So I had a wonderful weekend. Rhys leaves today, while I’m at work so I don’t get to see him off.

This weekend my wonderful cousin Marcus from London is visiting me! Of which I’m very excited about. At least someone loves me! J It’ll be my first time in Birmingham on the weekend so it’ll be good to be a tourist with my cousin and see the sights of Birmingham. I think it’ll take all of Sat afternoon. :) There’s actually quite a few historical buildings and things to do. Cirque du Soleil is currently in town etc.

Take care all and talk soon

Miranda

PS. Started the weekend off by seeing a cool jazz quartet at the Symphony Hall this evening, here in Birmingham, courtesy of the arts council here for free. :) Twas lovely.

Week 1 down

Dear all

Hope you are all well.

Things are going well here. I’m slowly adjusting to the cold (although all the locals constantly remind me that it is ‘mild’ and not very cold at all). My nose still goes berserk every time I go in or out of doors.

Last weekend Rhys and I travelled down to London to visit our friends. We dined in Soho at a cheap and decent Indian restaurant. Harry (good friend, ex-pat from Australia) afforded us lovely accommodation at his new abode at Canary Wharf. The place really looks like something you’d get in Australia, which is unusual for UK/Europe. The water pressure was like Australia – which is something else unusual here.

Getting used to the water taps here is quite a challenge too. Separate hot and cold taps with low water pressure is hard.

Anyway back to London. We went to some lovely markets in Shropshire on Sunday. We found a genuine french baker who made lamingtons (Australian sweet – sponge squares covered in chocolate and coconut for those who don’t know) in the middle of London. So of course we had to buy some as well as these awesome almond croissants that he offered as a sampler. On the way in I went past an Illy coffee stall so had to get one on the way out. It was made and served by a genuine Italian. He counted out my british pound change in Italian. It was great.

Started work on Monday and it has been an easy week. I was working with two other guys and didn’t realise that they were all my junior until half way through the week. It was cool taking a back seat, but we learned from each other so it was cool. They do way less work than back home.

This weekend I went to Cardiff. Rhys went to Paris on Thursday as he got cheap travel where I couldn’t leaving on Friday after work. Apparently it’s a mid-term break and Valentine’s weekend and there is only one flight on Friday night from Birmingham to Paris. Eurostar is ridiculously expensive unless you book early.

I tried getting cheap travel to Paris but fronting up to the airport airline desks. I was flatly refused anything under £400. They don’t do walk in last minute deals anymore apparently. An older gentleman at British always took pity on me and offered me a flight to Brussells and then return from Paris for £180. Which was really nice and best deal, but still a lot of money for a weekend.

So I ended up getting a 4 star hotel in Cardiff and return train tickets for £100 instead. Cardiff was lovely Very windy. It was raining on Saturday. It was like Brisbane. Sun shower, then torrential rain for a 5 minutes then back to sun showers. The sun was actually out. Which is probably what made it nice. The sun was out all weekend, out and then behind clouds and out again.

I visited the Cardiff Castle and the Love Spoon store. That was very interesting. Love Spoons are an Old Welsh tradition. The guy carves from wood a spoon to show his serious intentions toward his love. I saw the largest and the smallest. Very cool stuff.

Cardiff Castle was unique. Right in the heart of the city. City Hall was nearby and beautiful too.
I also went down to Cardiff Bay and saw the renowned 5 star St David hotel. Visited and dined at Mermaid Quay in a pub advertising home cooked meals (it was good and cheap). Looked into Millennium Centre. Learnt about the Wales political system at Pierhead. I got a thirst to go to Norway from the Norwegian Arts Centre and got a good view of the Bay from the Cardiff Bay visitor centre that’s shaped like a telescope.

Didn’t learn a word of Welsh, but enjoyed my time there.

Tomorrow I head off for a small place near Milton Keynes called Leighton Buzzard. It’s outside London and 100 miles from Birmingham. I’m already on an away job on my second week of work. I found out late Friday afternoon as I was by chance in the office. But apparently that’s normal.

Also found out they hadn’t heard about this travel allowance I’m meant to get to make up the difference between my Australian wages and living in Britain. So I have mentioned it to a manager and hopefully they’ll follow up because my Australian wage isn’t going to cover everything!

Apparently we are staying in a place called the Cock Inn in Leighton Buzzard. SO I will be spending Valentine’s day with a guy from the office at the Cock Inn.

Good laugh isn’t it.

Talk to you all next time. Thanks for all your emails, I will hopefully respond soon.

Arrived in Birmingham

Next email - 4 Feb 2005

I have arrived safely in Birmingham. It is not as cold as expected or as it has been! Only around 7 degrees rather than 0. :)

I arrived on Wednesday and thought i had to start work on Thursday. As it happens they weren't expecting me in at work until Friday afternoon (today, now) to pick up my laptop and get acquainted with the software etc.

So yesterday I spent the whole day (just about) in bed where it was nice and warm. I have been sneezing a lot but hopefully it is just to do with aclimatising rather than getting sick.My sister's wedding went extraordinarily well and it's hard to believe it was only 6 days ago. It was a very long day but very wonderful.

Sunday the festivities continued with Monday morning everyone rushing to pack as my relatives and family left for Hong Kong/Taiwan at 2pm and my brother back to Sydney at 3pm. Which left me about 2 hours to pack for Birmingham before my flight that night. :) So it's been a little hectic. :)

We had a brief stopover in Dubai which was lovely. Their winter is 27 degrees celcius with night time about 15. Very interesting culture and place to visit. Wish I had more time it was really incredible and would recommend anyone to visit. Felt very safe although we were mostly the only westerners around wherever we went.

I had a nice introduction to Birmingham when we arrived. Hopped onto the train to New street station (central train station) from the airport went to clean the lens on my glasses and they snapped in two. I believe it is the weather that caused it as they are made of titanium which are apparently unbreakable. So when Jo (friend from BDO Birmingham office) greeted me at New street I was wearing half a pair of glasses and squinting rather badly. :) I was able to secure a new set of glasses/spectacles that afternoon fortunately. I am going for the unbreakable type again as they did last 18 months (longest any spectacles have). However it has cost me a small fortune to do so! :)

The separate hot and cold water tap system is difficult to get used to but the place we are staying is comfortable and Dan and Jo (our housemates who work at BDO too) are lovely and have made us feel welcome.

All in all, all is well. Not much else to report! :)